Universal basic income?

No idea about the concept of a universal basic income. I feel like in Australia it could go either way.

My comment relates to the level of $800 a month, which is supposed to make sure every person in society can meet basic living standards. $800 a month equates to $184.61 per week. This seems low. Is that really enough to meet basic living standards?

How do you feel about a guaranteed, unconditional monthly wage?

 

Sure until we run out of other peoples money

 

No thanks

 

I'm for a universal basic income. I don't know that $800 is enough to live on though. I'm assuming that people on a ubi would also get housing assistance.

 

I have no idea what would happen on the economics side of it and with my background, I would not want to comment.

I'm thinking more of the $184.61 per week to live on. Do you have any concept of how adequate this amount might be for someong to meet basic living standards? It has been a long time since I was a student so I can't conceptualise living on an amount that low.

 

Coming from a south East Asian country, my first job 12 years ago was 600 dollars a month and saved 20% of it.

We are a very adaptable species

Today, that amount isn't enough for a degustation meal.

 

That's the part I was interested in. $800/month is $9,600 per year. Which does seem drastically low if housing is included. If housing assistance was on top of that, it is possibly doable. I don't know.

 

That's a great effort!

It might be possible for people who don't live in Sydney...

 

I read about it here Switzerland will be the first country in the world to vote on having a national wage of £1,700 a month | Europe | News | The Independent

And the amount was much higher. 2500 swiss francs works out to be about $3600 a month i think.

 

Exactly, where you live would make an enormous difference. In Syd we live 200 miles from each other in million dollar mcmansions and pay $7 a litre in petrol

As for the idea, it's one of those typical idiotic socialist ideas that people with no economic sense love.

 

@THX, on the other hand, would you complain if the gov increased your income buy $800 per month guaranteed? Think about servicing capacity!

 

So i dont think anyone is suggesting $800 would work in australia. I think the person quoted was just pointing out that you could replace social payments with a universal $740 a month and the budget would be no worse off.

As i pointed out in my previous post, switzerland would be spending much more on this policy than their current social payments and certainly more than $800 a month.

I think its an interesting idea but surely it would just lead to massive inflation?

 

haha true but the market would just compensate, and banks aren't dumb

 

Sorry I missed that post. Thanks for the link. It's certainly an interesting idea. As for causing inflation, I have no idea. Apparently it wouldn't according to an article I read but did not understand:

Wouldn’t Unconditional Basic Income Just Cause Massive Inflation? — Basic income

 

I'm all for this but the trade would be you can have $800 welfare a month in return for being sterilised.

Now, imagine the long term benefit in that.

 

That was my first reaction too. It has been trialled in the Netherlands with some interesting results. One argument against the idea is that if people had a guaranteed income, they would not longer choose to performing soul-crushing jobs like cleaning or garbage collection. The issue with this is, take away the cleaners and garbage collecters (for example) and things grind to a halt.

My issue with the whole concept is that different people react different to being given free money. Some thrive, some don't. I would be concerned for the people who don't.

http://www.news.com.au/finance/econ...o/news-story/4893d7009dd449531faf41fa828d5fe7

True. This happened in Perth when the FHOG was increased to $10,000.

 

I think it would work out being cheaper in terms of cost. It would certainly cut out a lot of administrative costs. The way I look at it: some people feel like they're getting something for free when they're on the dole. If everyone is getting it, there's no sense of shafting the system. I think it might incentivise people to work.

 

There was a similar thread on this not long ago. In it I posted an article about UBI being trialled in Canada (I think) and it was found not to have this effect.

 

Stupid idea.
Those who really need it could not live off $800 a month. And there are genuine people in 'need'.
And for the rest of us it is a handout we don't actually 'need'.

The welfare system definitely needs a complete overhaul, but that is not the way to do it.

 

in some ways i think it would work better in this respect. at the moment, people get "free money" in the dole, where work is disincentivised in having half of every dollar you earn being subtracted from your dole payment. That whole marginal benefit thing is pretty low.

If you were to replace that with a UBI, then you could then go out and work without it being effectively taxed at above the maximum rate. This would encourage people to work.

Plus you could do it in a way that simplifies the welfare system.

 

The only way any idea such as this would work is in a post scarcity society a la Star Trek. We're a long way off that utopia.